"cooking utensils" news and stories

The other night I was making some cookie dough for later in the week, and as I gazed at my vast amounts of cooking utensils I found myself wishing for another rubber spatula. How is it that I have so many ladles, tongs, metal spatulas, and slotted spoons and only one rubber spatula? Granted, I get a lot of kitchen stuff as Christmas and birthday gifts, but at some point I should have realized which utensils I use the most and stock up. Here are some of my favorite cooking tools. What are some of yours?

1. Rubber spatulas: great for getting every last bit of food out of a bowl
2. Wooden spoons won't scratch my non stick pans
3. Cake spatulas may not see the light of day very often, but I still love them
4. I use my eight inch French knife just about every time I cook
5. Tongs make cooking so much easier
6. I like to use a whisk rather than sift.
7. Kitchen shears are for everything from opening packages to prepping fresh herbs
8. I don't know if my Kitchen Aid counts, but it belongs on my list anyway.

We always love a good giveaway here at Slashfood, and even if we're not the ones who are doing the giving away, we still like to let our favorite Slashfoodies know about other opportunities.

ThisNext.com is giving away a set of stainless steel cooking utensils from Tovolo.com on their site for participating in their weekly contest. Since summer entertaining is right around the corner, this is the perfect time to stock up on highly-heat-resistant silicone and stainless steel utensils. Here are just a few of the goods in the prize package, but head over to ThisNext.com for the details on how to enter:

• Stainless Steel Hemisphere Measuring Cups with handles that are also measuring spoons
• Silicone Spatula with a stainless steel handle
• Stainless Steel Perforated Colander
• Stainless Steel Double-Sided Measuring Spoons
• Silicone Trivets
• Stainless Steel and Silicone Barbecue Brush

Though the news clips on their website are no longer available, it seems that Surfas, the restaurant supply store in Culver City, Ca, will be closing as of November 1 this year. The City of Culver City has declared the property on which the store is located "Eminent Domain," and will be using it for a large re-development project. According to food blog Eating LA apparently, owner "Les Surfas, whose father opened the store in 1937, has refused to accept Culver City's offer of $4.89 million to buy the Surfas warehouse." Others are speculating that the store will not close,and will simply move to another location.

• Rumours and discussion at Chowhound
• Save Our Surfas Blog
• News at Eating LA
• Les Surfas answers questions about his refusal of the offer from Culver City to buy

Before there ever was my dream birthday gift, the KitchenAid stand mixer in pink, we had to whip cream and egg whites by hand. The horror! But I will admit that sometimes it's just easier to grab a whisk and do the dirty work than maneuvering that giant stand mixer from the corner, dust off the bowl, and wash everything afterwards.

To make life easier for those of who prefer whipping the old fashioned way for whatever reason, Kuhn Rikon of Switzerland has a cool little double-balloon whisk. The whisk has a second, smaller wire balloon inside the regular balloon that, with twice the number of wires, can do the whipping in half the time.

The double balloon whisk comes in both a 10" and 12" size, for $14 and $16 respectively, and can be purchased from Amazon.com, Cooking.com, and Kitchen Kapers.

[via:CoolHunting]

Alright, so maybe it doesn't really say "I love you" to anyone else except yourself since this heart-shaped egg frying pan cooks one egg, but it sure is cute, nonetheless The pan is non-stick and has a lid, though I''m not sure what you'd ever use a lid for when cooking one egg!

The pan is available from Pink Gorgeous Shopping in the UK for £5.00. The shopping site also has a number of other cute and kitschy items for the kitchen and home.